“His Second Majesty is thirty feet tall with brows like sleeping silkworms, phoenix eyes, a voice like a beautiful woman, tusks like carrying-poles and a nose like a dragon. If he's in a fight he only needs to wrinkle his nose for his enemy to be scared witless even if he's covered in bronze and iron.”
“Evil spirits who get people with their noses are easy enough to catch,” said Monkey, who then asked, “and what powers does His Third Majesty have?”
“He's no monster from the mortal world,” the young devil replied. “His name is Ten Thousand Miles of Cloud Roc. When he moves he rolls up the wind and shifts the waves, shaking the North as he heads for the South. He carries a treasure about with him called the Male and Female Vital Principles Jar. Anyone who's put in that jar is turned liquid in a few moments.”
That news gave Monkey something to worry about. “I'm not scared of the monsters,” he thought, “but I'll have to watch out for his jar.” Then he said aloud, “Your account of Their Majesties' powers isn't bad-it fits exactly with what I know. But which of them wants to eat the Tang Priest?”
“Don't you know, sir?” said the young Wind-piercer.
“As if I didn't know better than you!” shouted Monkey. “I was told to come and question you because they're worried that you don't know all the details.”
“Our Senior King and Second King have long lived in Lion Cave on Lion Mountain,” the young devil replied, “but the Third King doesn't live here. He used to live over a hundred miles to the West of here in the capital of a country called Leonia. Five hundred years ago he ate the king of the country, his civil and military officials, and everybody else in the city, young and old, male and female. So he seized their country, and now all the people there are evil monsters. I don't know which year it was in which he heard that the Tang court has sent a priest to the Western Heaven to fetch the scriptures. They say this priest is a good man who has cultivated his conduct for ten incarnations, and anyone who eats a piece of his flesh will live for ever and never grow old. But the Third King is worried about the priest's disciple Sun the Novice who's a real terror, so he's come to swear brotherhood with our two kings, all three are now working together to catch the Tang Priest.”
“Damn this thoroughly ill-behaved monster,” thought Brother Monkey with great fury. “I'm protecting the Tang Priest while he works for the true achievement. How dare they plot to eat my man?” With a snort of fury he ground his steel teeth and brandished his iron cudgel as he leapt down from the high pinnacle and smashed the poor young devil's head into a lump of meat. When he saw what he had done Monkey felt sorry.
“Oh dear,” he thought, “he meant well, telling me all about the house. Why did I finish him off all of a sudden like that? Oh well! Oh well! That's that.” The splendid Great Sage had been forced to do this because his master's way ahead had been blocked. He took the little devil's pass off him, tied it round his own waist, put the “By order" flag over his shoulder, hung the bell from his waist and sounded the clappers with his hand. Then he made a hand-spell into the wind, said a spell, shook himself, turned into the exact likeness of the junior Wind-piercer, and went straight back the way he had come, looking for the cave to find out about the three demon chieftains. Indeed:
The Handsome Monkey King had a thousand transformations
And the true power of magic to make ten thousand changes.
Monkey was rushing deep into the mountains along the way he had come when suddenly he heard shouts and whinnies. As he looked up he saw tens of thousands of little devils drawn up outside the entrance to the Lion Cave with their spears, sabers, swords, halberds, flags and banners. Monkey was delighted.
“Li Changgeng, the planet, was telling the truth,” he thought. “He wasn't lying at all.” The devils were drawn up in a systematic way, each 250 forming a company, so that from the forty standards in many colours that were dancing in the wind he could tell that there were ten thousand infantry and cavalry there.
“If I go into the cave disguised as a junior Wind-piercer and one of the demon chiefs questions me about my mountain patrol,” Monkey thought, “I'll have to make up answers on the spur of the moment. The moment I say anything at all wrong he'll realize who I am and I won't be able to get away. That army on the gates would stop me and I'd never get out. If I'm going to catch the demon kings I'll have to get rid of the devils on the gates first.”
Do you know how he was going to do that? “The old demons have never seen me,” he thought, “they've only heard of my reputation. I'll talk big and scare them with my fame and prestige. If it's true that all living beings in the middle land are destined to have the scriptures brought to them, then all I need do is talk like a hero and scare those monsters on the gate away. But if they're not destined to have the scriptures brought to them I'll never get rid of the spirits from the gates of this cave in the West even if I talk till lotus flowers appear.” Thus he thought about his plans, his mind questioning his mouth and his mouth questioning his mind, as he sounded the clappers and rang the bell.
Before he could rush in through the entrance to Lion Cave he was stopped by the junior devils of the forward camp, who said, “You're back, young Wind-piercer.” Monkey said nothing but kept going with his head down.
When he reached the second encampment more young devils grabbed hold of him and said, “You're back, young Wind-piercer.”
“Yes,” Monkey replied. “On your patrol this morning did you meet a Sun the Novice?” they asked.
“I did,” Monkey replied. “He was polishing his pole.”
“What's he like?” the terrified devils asked. “What sort of pole was he polishing?”
“He was squatting beside a stream,” Monkey replied. “He looked like one of those gods that clear the way. If he'd stood up I'm sure he'd have been hundreds of feet tall, and the iron cudgel he was holding was a huge bar as thick as a rice-bowl. He'd put a handful of water on a rocky scar and was polishing the cudgel on it muttering, 'Pole, it's ages since I got you out to show your magic powers: This time you can kill all the demons for me, even if there are a hundred thousand of them. Then I'll kill the three demon chiefs as a sacrificial offering to you.' He's going to polish it till it shines then start by killing the ten thousand of you on the gates.”
On hearing this the little devils were all terror-struck and their souls all scattered in panic. “Gentlemen,” Monkey continued, “that Tang Priest has only got a few pounds of flesh on him. We won't get a share. So why should we have to carry the can for them? We'd do much better to scatter.”
“You're right,” the demons said. “Let's all run for our lives.” If they had been civilized soldiers they would have stayed and fought to the death, but as they were all really wolves, tigers and leopards, running beasts and flying birds, they all disappeared with a great whoosh. Indeed, it wasn't as if the Great Sage Sun had merely talked big: it was like the time when Xiang Yu's army of eight thousand soldiers disappeared, surrounded by foes who were former comrades.
“Splendid,” said monkey to himself with self-congratulation, “the old devils are as good as dead now. If this lot run away at the sound of me they'll never dare look me in the face. I'll use the same story when I go in there. If I said anything different and one or two of the young devils had got inside and heard me that would give the game away.” Watch him as he carefully approaches the ancient cave and boldly goes deep inside.
If you don't know what of good or ill was to come from the demon chieftains listen to the explanation in the next installment.